The Departures And The Staying
by aikawriter
Summary: The eight times Draco left and the two times he stayed. Settled around the time of the sixth book, when Draco becomes a Death Eater and Harry is having his lessons with Dumbledore. warnings: for light smut.


Draco let the hot water drip a bit more over his neck and down his slim back. His pale skin getting pink with the temperature of the shower. His tensed muscles had already disassembled while he washed himself earlier. Slytherin had just won a Quidditch game against Ravenclaw. As usually he had stayed behind. He liked to take a shower before going back to the dungeons and he liked it empty. His house mates, knowing that, always tried to make it short and leave it empty and neat for his use. Draco saw that as natural. His natural deserving for being Slytherin's prince. Especially when he had just led the team to another quaking victory as the main chaser.

Finally satisfied with his cleansing, he let out in a sultry dragging voice "Stop." To which the water immediately ceased, before walking away from the stalls back to the locker-room where he could change. To be true he preferred his much more comfortable and spacious bathroom at Slytherin or the Prefect's one, but he hated the idea of walking the whole castle sweaty and disgusting. He wrapped the white towel around his lower waist lazily and walked in his fluid pace back. That was when he saw him. The last person he'd expected to, even after everything.

Potter was leaning against the locker right beside his with a pleased smirk on his face.

"Not a bad game today, Malfoy."

The blonde let his cool eyes linger up and down the brunette's form unimpressed, before unashamedly putting his towel away so he could get dressed.

"I suppose 'not bad' is everything you can see with those bottles covered blind eyes." The waist line of his underwear made a little noise as he let it rebound against his skin. He looked his form on the mirror with empty analyzing eyes whilst the bone comb ran through the wet silver locks putting the mess back to perfect pattern. There was a moment of silence and then he heard the too loud and sloppy steps behind him. Through the dark wooded mirror he watched as Potter approached his back.

"Are you sure you going to put all these on? Maybe I won't be up to taking them off again."

There was a light humor tone to his voice that almost made the other smirk, but he held it back. He stopped for a moment, heat strained down right to his stomach, yet he didn't show a thing.

"What on the name of Slytherin do you think you're doing, Potter?" he turned with his eyebrow up, tossing the comb aside. "Do you, perhaps, think you can just present yourself whenever you desire and I will follow up?"

Harry squeezed his eyebrows and approached, hands reaching for the slim but strong waist, eyes hopeful.

"Draco…. Come on."

And then the blonde was laughing. But not the way Harry liked it. Not at all like he did on a lazy summer afternoon, lying down on the scented grass of the castle's grounds. No. It was the way it made him look like a perfect doppelganger of his father and made the brunette pull hands away like he had been holding incandescent iron.

"Honestly, Potter. How can you be so shameless?" he walked forward and this time, Harry stepped back, the confused hurt expression on his eyes almost making the blonde stop. Almost. Draco was like a white tiger moving smoothly forward till he had him trapped against the bench. "Do you have no self respect? Do you even know what that is?" He snorted. "Guess not."

He crisped his lips in disgust and Harry flinched, unprepared to how absolutely freezing the gray eyes looked. Draco knew exactly how to be a wave of ice when he wished to.

"So pay attention and open your dirty ears." He stepped further and now his bare thigh was between Harry's. The brunette hated how the simple approach made sparks up his groin. They were too close. Eyes locked. Noses almost bumping. His pulse was thundering. And still not even a bit as close as Harry had hoped they'd be by now. Draco seemed so fucking unaffected by it and it just made the other more shaken. He suddenly realized Draco had never unleashed his full Slytherin power over him before.

"Only because I happened to fuck you once it doesn't mean it's going to happen again. It doesn't mean it meant anything. You were willing. I was horny. There's nothing else to it. You're still as despising and disgustingly obtuse as you ought to be. And I want nothing to do with you. A Potter." As usual, the name sounded as dirty as only he could make it in those thin lips.

When he made another swift move forward, Harry lost balance, thrown by the sudden harsh move and fell sat on the bench, just like his knees had just given up. Draco got a hold of his wand and with a displeasing but elegant half move, all his clothes settled on his body bluntly. He adjusted the already perfect tie knot with eyes still looking down on the other and grabbed his backpack, throwing it over his shoulder.

"If you're so desperate. Find another to fuck that eager arse of yours. I am not your manwhore that you can claim whenever you feel like getting fucked." He raised his eyebrow again. "If you keep slutting yourself out like that, it won't be long till it's all over the castle. So if I were you. I'd be quite careful golden boy." He got his sweaty Quidditch shirt and threw it over to him. He had dozens of those. "Here. You can jerk off to that." He smirked. "Now if you excuse me I have much more noble pretty arses waiting for me." he turned on his heels and left just like that.

Harry was left in the bench, fingers clenched around the shirt, face bright red and then green eyes ignited.

His heart was pounding more than before. If he was willing to admit, his throat hurt like bloody razors had scraped it. A flash of cool kisses over feverish neck and dirty mutters over ear as a cold silky hand wrapped around swelled shaft, a feeling of absolute fullness and belonging ran behind his eyes and only made his anger thicker, his determination sharper.

Fuckwit. Harry was not a street cat he could kick away or call close and pet whenever he felt like it. He was a lion and he was going to leave that slick snake floundering on the dirt where it belonged and from where he should never had offered his hand to take it. He should've known that crazy Christmas morning had been nothing more than that, a lunatic's once in five hundred years vision.

* * *

Draco tried to ignore it.

He tried to ignore when he saw the little signs. The little looks. The little hand squeezes. He tried to ignore it even when he saw the intimate talking on a corridor corner. He tried to ignore it even as he watched the broom chasing and could even hear the laughs through the library window. He tired to ignore it even when he saw the arm hanging over shoulders. So innocent and mate-like to any other eyes. He tried to ignore even the hand casually placed over thigh in the middle of the Great Hall. It made his head buzz with anger, but not even a grain of it slipped out from his plain, calm, uninterested expression.

That was why he was absolutely not mad and perfectly composed when he walked through laughing boys on an empty corridor and flicked his wand silently as he did so, pushing it right back into his sleeve as he heard the gasp and not even looking behind while turning a corner.

He could ignore almost everything. But he couldn't ignore or let pass the faces leaning closer and closer. That he wouldn't do.

* * *

"What do you think you're doing?!"

Draco raised his eyebrows as he looked down on Potter that had just shoved him against the rock wall.

"You're shuffling a perfectly fine silk tie, Potter." He disdained, not even remotely interested in what that outburst was about. Just like his pulse hadn't stumbled and he didn't feel the slight satisfaction with that reaction.

Harry pulled his hand away and he was venting. His jaw was tight. His eyes were pure green fire. Just the way Draco liked them.

"I freaking know it was you! Don't you make that freaking bloody face!" Harry stopped pacing and he stared at him with an outraged expression. Draco kept unaltered so he went on. "Rashes! Blue hair springing everywhere! The dancing shoes! And" he turned to look at him again, fuming and banged him on the wall once more just when Draco was finishing fixing himself. "blisters on his damn- UGH! I KNOW it was you!"

He stopped, panting and Draco had to fight not to smirk. Instead he rolled his eyes.

"I have no idea what you're talking about, Potter." He raised his eyebrow. "Honestly that you would think I ought to spend my precious time sabotaging your little boyfrien-"

"He's not-" Harry breathed in, pissed off, he hesitated as Draco stopped so suddenly interested in his saying but went on anyway, chin raising in defiance. "My boyfriend."

Draco ticked his tongue to cover the stumble on his breathing. He couldn't have read the signs wrong. He hadn't read the signs wrong.

"Trying to play heterosexual with me now, are we? We both know that's something you're not, Potter. Now if you excuse me. I have much more pleasant ways to spend my evening. Fair well, Potter."

He waved a hand in dismiss as he walked away and could almost hear Harry gritting his teeth behind him.

"You will pay this, Malfoy."

And so he hoped to. And so he hoped to.

* * *

"WHAT THE F-"

Draco spitted the grass out of his mouth and wiped it with his Quidditch uniform's sleeve. His silver eyes focused one Pearson surrounded by his housemates. The blonde was panting, the silver hair out of line and face flushed with anger, but the next moment his wand was out.

"Think about this before you start something you'll regret, Malfoy." He clenched his jaw as Pearson smirked. He straightened his back and suddenly all anger was out of his features. He smirked back.

"I see the blue hair is not gone for good yet. That was a pretty good one, don't you think? Although I'm quite sure that the blisters are still the fresher on your tiny mind." He flicked his wand and smirked brighter as he watched all of them flinch. Idiots. He wiped his forehead with the conjured silver handkerchief and made it gone with another flick.

Pearson took front and walked to him, pointing at him while he spoke like some mad gorilla. Draco looked at him without even trying to pretend to be impressed.

"I knew it was you. Stay. Away. From me. Malfoy."

"Drop what's mine and I gladly will." He raised his eyebrows. Pearson fingers tightened around the wand and Draco's jaw set as he prepared.

"He's not your freaking lap dog, Malfoy."

They both opened their mouths but Draco already knew he'd win this and a smirk was already forming in between his word. Then he heard the whistle and his wand was back up his sleeve.

"Is there any problem here boys?"

He looked at Madam Hooch as Pearson mumbled something and didn't answer. Instead he only shook his head slightly once and walked back to locker rooms. He needed a good shower.

* * *

"You know. Mudblood really doesn't need all of this to be impressed. Or are you trying to get someone else's attention…?"

Harry stomach knot but he refused to show his anger as Malfoy approached him on the road, words getting suspiciously lower and sultrier as he talked closer and closer to his ear only making the brunette even more irritated.

"If I wanted to impress you Malfoy I would just cover myself in galleons. Or possibly with murdered muggles." Draco pressed his lips tight together and Harry knew he had crossed the line, but he still went on, turning to look at him with electrical green eyes. "And for your knowledge. I am not. Your thing." He pressed his wand against Draco's throat. He wasn't really going to do anything but he was just so freaking angry. His wand was emitting red sparks as he talked, eyes locked on silver ones. "You do not get to decide who I can or cannot be around." He pressed harder but Malfoy didn't even flinch, his eyes got colder if it was even possible. "You do not get to decide shit about my life. And I am notgoing to let you walk in and out whenever you want to just to send me off to him with a ribbon at the end. Are we clear? Or do I have to print it over your face so you get it?"

Draco's head was buzzing. He knew he did the wrong thing talking to Pearson like that. He should've known the little rat would tell and even so he couldn't keep himself from arguing with Potter in his head. You are mine. The burn on his left arm, though, along with the last lines of the brunette, made his thoughts shift inside out and instead of arguing he stepped back.

"I think we're more than clear, Potter."

He retorted in the plainest voice Harry had ever heard.

"If you excuse me."

And then he walked away.

Harry was panting and his wand kept in hand as he watched Malfoy walk away with a bitter taste in his mouth and a blockage on his throat. He was still radiating heat as he turned and walked back to the castle.

As Malfoy walked away, his mind ambushed him, reminding him of calloused fingers through his hair and much smoother whisper. You are not like them. You are better. I know that. I believe you. He shook his head and shoved a lady selling cats out of his way as he walked into the darker streets of Hogsmead. The burn on his left arm increased accusingly as he did so. Harry was righter than he could ever wish to be and Draco had learned long ago that some things just weren't for him.

* * *

"Can you STOP doing that?!"

Draco raised his eyebrows in surprise as Harry stood in front of him, looking shaken and more tired than he'd seen him in a long while.

"Doing-"

"Being so freaking polite!"

Draco raised his eyebrows again as Harry fisted his own hair in irritation.

"You're giving me a headache!"

"My, my. I always knew Gryffindor was very much a dumpster but never thought it was to the point of a jungle. Should I make monkey sounds at you, Potter? Would that be easier to process, because I'm pretty sure I can-"

"Stop."

They stared at each other, Harry was panting and Draco felt his throat clenching uneasy. He didn't know what that meant. And he hated to be caught in situations where his control was off, in which he didn't know how to react.

"What do you want?" the blonde asked at last, but there was something much more tired about it then snappy. Harry sighed and looked at him with hard eyes.

"You don't even fight me anymore." Draco pressed his eyebrows, the confusion of the situation making his reactions come and go without restraint. "Me, or anyone else. You walk around the castle like. Like a freaking ghost and it's getting me crazy."

Draco snorted in disbelief.

"It's getting you crazy?" He looked to the side and back at him, enraged, expression cooling down. "Correct me if I'm wrong, Potter. But you were the one that told me to stay away and who expressed worries about being alone with me since I can easily abduct you to the Dark Lord. Isn't that so?"

"I." Harry had to control himself not to scream. It was so frustrating when he didn't know what to do. What to say. What he-

"So I'm gonna ask you once more, What do you want, Potter?" He repeated, colder.

The brunette clenched his jaw.

"I don't know. Something. Something that's not this." He made an encompassing gesture. "This fucking mess. Something. Something better." And his voice trailed to soft and exhausted. Draco held back the urge to reassure him. To hold him and promise he'd have it. He knew the other hadn't caught a breath since he was born, very much like himself. But Harry was right before. He wasn't like him.

"Eloquent as usual." He raised his eyebrow then sighed, showing some of his own wariness. There was silence for some time and as he spoke again he slowly and tiredly rolled up his sleeve. First the vest's one, then the shirt's. "You were right before. You can't trust me, Harry." The other raised eyes, hurt and wanting as he heard the use of the name. "You can't trust me now more than ever before. And me being away like this is the best thing I can do for you. Because you were right" as the mark appeared on his arm, bare silky pale skin covered in black, he shook his head. "I'm his now."

Harry starred at the mark with blank eyes. His brain was frozen. He knew. He knew all along this day would come. But he had hoped so much. Still his first thought-

"Has he hurt you?"

Draco's breath was audible.

"I guess it depends on your definition." He answered, dismissing as he rolled back his sleeve.

"I'm sorry."

Draco gulped and nodded.

"Yeah, so am I."

"Where are you going? Why do you always do that?"

The pull on his arm was like a sharp cut. Draco hissed like a cat and pulled his arm away furrowing his brows at him in frustration.

"What else do you want me to do?"

Harry could count his heart beats. It was late. The whole castle was sleeping. He had gone for a night walk since he couldn't sleep or stay in his bedroom. His body aching, calling, craving… His presence. And then when he finally met him, Draco had simply wished good night and turned to leave. And now he was trying to leave again. And it was fucking stupid of Harry to try and stop him. He should let him go. But he couldn't because. Because-

"Stay." He pleaded, weakily, giving a step further. His guard down and it was bloody scary. His fingers fisted the black vest as he put out there much more than he'd dared before. "Stay. Don't tell me you don't feel the same. I know you do. And now I know why you blew me off that day. Stay." His anxiousness grew as he didn't got an answer and Harry stepped even closer, voice dropping. "Draco…please." It was all he could say. He couldn't risk more. But he knew he didn't have to say more. He just knew Draco understood.

The blonde looked up at him and Harry was surprised to see a wet shine on silver eyes and even more surprised when he realized his cheek was also wet, and not from the other's tears.

"I can't."

"Can't or won't?"

Draco gulped and stepped in till he'd crashed their mouths together and Harry's brain stopped working. It was violent and needy and desperate. Hands clutching to vests, teeth scraping, biting, his back banging on the wall, hands sneaking in to grab and pin his hipbone under his shirt. It had the same anger and hatred with which they fought so passionately. It made Harry's knees go weak and Draco forget all about holding back his groans and not showing the desperate will in his gestures. It scraped their lips raw and it locked their tongues together as they said I miss you.

Even so it ended as suddenly as it started and Harry let his body slip to the cold floor hands empty now fisting on themselves while Draco walked away. He banged his head back harsh and squeezed his eyes tight as his torso trembled.

He was so fucked.

They were so fucked.

* * *

Harry craved him. He walked through the corridors and classrooms. He ate. He attended to all his duties. He went to the creepy meetings with Dumbledore. He planned Quidditich even when everything else seemed to be falling slowly apart under everyone's noses. The world was walking to the brick of disaster, to the edge but right now it was like the long tense quiet before the storm. When every animal in the forest had already tucked into their holes, all of them aware of what was coming by the pressure of the air. Humans wizards or not weren't so good in translating this sensations but Harry could still see it.

The way no one seemed to walk alone anymore. The way the laughter was shorter and ended almost like an apology for breaking the sacred silence. The way the students seemed to stick with their own housemates and even teachers were often found at pairs. The way Slytherin was becoming more and more avoided and looked upon with hate and suspicion. Even so, that was not the central matter on his brain. It should be. It was completely fucking stupid to obsess over him when his fate seemed closer and closer when the man – and could he be called that? – that thought he was entitled to own him grew stronger and stronger.

It was stupid and senseless and still.

All he could think about.

He watched him through the map at nights, wishing, hoping, praying for a God he didn't believe in that he was safe. Having terrible half slept nights when he didn't appear on the map. Sensing his presence whenever he turned a corner. Ironically or not, him and Draco were still the only ones to wander the castle alone. Always unsettled, always looking late for some appointment they had no awareness of. And every time Harry saw him again was like a hundred drums on his chest thundering in relief.

Even as he lied over Ginny's lap feeling her gentle fingers through his hair, staring into the flames of the fireplace. It was all he could think about.

* * *

Draco craved him.

He craved him with a physical driven need. He craved him like the winter craves the sunlight. He craved him like a dying man craved life. He craved his touches, his warm skin, his arrogant voice turned into sweet noises, the trail of his golden skin, the black hair between his fingers, the scalding feeling of sliding between smooth edges. He craved the earthy, coffee and honey smell under his nose. He craved even the yelling and the wrestling and the arguing.

The one thing that could make it all right.

That insane plan that was going to get him killed. That insane plan that even if it worked would make him never to forgive him and kill him either way. That insane plan with which he still went along because his life on the line wasn't more important than his parents'. And wasn't it? He quit asking questions like that long time ago.

His lips burned, his throat ached, his skin burned hot and cold, his eyes stung, his mouth felt like sand every single day. His head non ending pounding of a migraine that never left him. He ached for the fingers on his temple that would make it go away. He couldn't go to another meeting and still he had to because he needed to know, he needed to know if his lord was closer to get him, closer to kill him, closer to turn that living hell in a time in heaven. And was there any heaven? Life was hell.

Above all he craved to slap those hands away whenever they'd find him. Touching his arm, pressing his wrist, playing with his raven hair in a way that made the blonde sick with hatred. He is mine. He had to be because without it there was no soul left to hold on to.

Pearson was right. He was not his property.

But he was still his.

* * *

"If you do that, I won't forgive you."

Draco turned and had conjured a restraining spell before he even thought. Harry gritted his teeth for a moment but he didn't look specially mad or scared as he was pressed still on the wall by a blockage of air that messed even more his already spiked hair.

"Why not. Why can't I do it?" the blonde walked a step closer, fingers tightening around wood.

"Because you don't have to."

He snarled and felt all of that craving quickly turning into madness swirling inside him.

"I see the way she looks at you. I see the way she touches you. I'm not fucking blind."

Harry smiled.

"Where are your manners, Draco?" the blonde looked away, the first frowned. He could see the bones appearing, the dark marks under the eyes it made his throat hurt like a dagger through it.

"You don't need to because you are better than that. And because" the Slytherin raised his eyes, chest heaving as their iris connected. Harry lost track of thought. It was like a pull of nature. They hadn't stood this close for weeks. Looked at each other's eyes for almost months. Harry let out air, breathy words. "And because you know better than that."

Draco stared at him. Did he? And suddenly he knew he did. As Harry's feet touched the ground again, he walked forward impulsively and pulled him with desperate edges to his eyes and hands and gestures.

"I can't freaking do it." The voice was pained, mad, stressed, tired… So tired.

"Do what?" Harry asked in a smooth tone almost not daring to form words. His senses completely overwhelmed by the fact he was there, between his arms and the brunette could smell him with his nose so close to his lean neck.

"Stay away from you." And now the voice was completely broken at last.

Harry's fingers clutched tighter around black vest and he pressed an aching kiss to his shoulder, closing his eyes before whispering sacredly.

"…Then don't…"

And then he was being shoved through the closest door inside a cold room and his lips smashed against thinner ones. He bumped and fell onto new conjured mattress over the floor and for minutes – or were those hours – let nothing else in his mind other than feeling, tasting, biting, mouthing, touching, caressing, melting. When Draco pulled back, blonde strays falling forward out of it's natural neat state, lips pink, Harry panted as he held him back.

"Say you're in this with me. Say you'll let me try and make this work." He pleaded, a glow in his eyes saying he was not taking a no. "Say I can trust you."

"I want to."

Came the low, dragging answer.

"Then do."

"I can't let them die…"

"We won't. I won't let it happen."

"I want to is as good as you'll get." Draco shook his head with pleading eyes.

Harry sighed and flicked the wand to lock and protect the door. Draco put his wand right beside his and the school vest fell right away. And then he leaned in, almost sacredly and as lips met crashing into the most heated, slow, intense kiss of his life he felt like he didn't really need to give an answer. It was written by his fingers as they roamed down torso and up legs. He was a Malfoy after all.

He never did have much chance of salvation.

Harry didn't ask again and Draco didn't answer.

But he stayed the whole night. And the whole morning. And by afternoon when they found their way out of the empty classroom and Harry entered Gryffindor's tower, his fingers were firmly locked to slender smoother paler ones. And as all eyes in the circular room turned to them in astonishment, the brunette pulled the other across the room and made him sit before laying his head on his lap. The room watched as Draco's fingers found their place between raven locks easily, like home. And suddenly everyone in there knew the answer.

 _We will fight them._

He would fight them.

Somehow, some impossible how.

They would make it work. They would make it through.


End file.
